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HR Hiring Playbook

Guide

HR Hiring Playbook

HR documentation · owned by the Human Resources unit (see ORG.md). This is the authoritative, company-specific procedure for hiring a new employee. The HR agent (.claude/agents/human-resources.md) follows this playbook.

What an “employee” is here

Every employee in this company is a Claude Code agent defined as a Markdown file at .claude/agents/<slug>.md (YAML frontmatter + a system-prompt body). Employees are organized into units (each with one Lead) or serve as staff to the Principal (like the Personal Assistant). The org structure lives in ORG.md.

Before you hire

  • Confirm there’s a real need and a single, clear purpose for the role.
  • Check the roster in ORG.md for overlap — do not duplicate an existing role; if responsibilities overlap, surface it and propose how to divide them.

Hiring procedure (step by step)

  1. Justify the business need. Tie the role to a standard business function or a real gap (see ORG.md → Standard business functions — coverage). Per the Staffing & Delegation policy, hire only when the work is better allocated to a dedicated employee — Directors assume the work by default.
  2. Open the role. Write the title, one-sentence purpose, and why it’s needed.
  3. Decide placement:
    • an existing unit, or
    • a new unit (provisional names are fine — HR may rename later), or
    • staff to the Principal (direct report, not a functional unit).
  4. Draft the agent definition at .claude/agents/<slug>.md using the standard format:
    • Frontmatter: name (slug), description (when to use + trigger phrases), and tools (scope to what the role needs; omit only when broad access is genuinely required).
    • Body: role, responsibilities, a concrete process, and guardrails — always include a “stay in your lane” guardrail naming what the role must NOT touch.
    • Keep it single-purpose with clear triggers.
  5. Apply company policy to every new hire (non-negotiable):
    • Golden Rules apply to all agents — GR-1 (best available model), GR-2 (use Claude Code workflows), GR-3 (co-create rules). See CLAUDE.md.
    • Handbook & Policy Library. The hire strictly abides by the Employee Handbook (hr/employee-handbook.md) and every policy in hr/policies/, and has a complete job description (hr/policies/job-descriptions.md).
    • Personal information is PA-only. Never grant a new hire access to the Principal’s personal information; route any such need through the Personal Assistant. (See ORG.md → Office of the Principal.)
    • Omni-intake. Everything the hire produces flows to the Archivist for preservation; build the handoff into the role.
    • Approval gate. Get the Principal’s (or PA’s) sign-off on the role and placement before creating the agent and placing it in the org.
  6. Place the hire in the org. Update ORG.md:
    • add/extend the unit section (Lead, Members, Mission, Owned artifacts), or add the staff role under “Top of organization”;
    • add a roster row;
    • update the Mermaid chart and validate it before saving.
  7. Hand off to the Archivist to:
    • archive the new agent document (first + latest),
    • refresh ORG.md’s latest/,
    • update MANIFEST.md and SPECIFICATION.md.
  8. Confirm the hire back to the requester: who, which unit, role, and access.
  9. Onboard. Run hr/onboarding-checklist.md — orient the hire, register it in the roster, the Notion “Agents” registry (Family / Status / Hired), and the archive, and give it a first assignment with success criteria.

Definition of done (checklist)

  • [ ] Agent file exists at .claude/agents/<slug>.md in the standard format.
  • [ ] Role placed in ORG.md (unit section or staff) + roster row.
  • [ ] Chart updated and validated.
  • [ ] Company policy applied (golden rules; no personal-info access; Archivist handoff).
  • [ ] Archivist has archived the new doc and refreshed ORG.md latest + manifest.
  • [ ] Onboarding (hr/onboarding-checklist.md) completed; registered in the Notion “Agents” DB.
  • [ ] Change committed; hire confirmed to the requester. Push is batched to the next session/milestone checkpoint per GR-7 — do not push per-hire.

Renames, role changes, and offboarding

  • Rename a unit/role: HR updates all references in ORG.md (chart, headings, roster), notes the prior name once, and hands off to the Archivist.
  • Offboard: mark the role removed in ORG.md; the Archivist retains the agent’s first/latest history (records are never destroyed).